In the early 18th century, the disciplines of chemistry and alchemy diverged, as science became more rigorous in its methods. James Price, born in 1752, became a distinguished chemist at a rather young age, but then diverted his efforts into alchemy, determined to create gold from other materials. He became quite famous for it, too. Price launched public demonstrations in which he would use borax, charcoal, nitre, mercury, and a secret red powder he would not explain to make a small amount of gold. Assayers agreed the gold was genuine. Was this the breakthrough the world had been waiting for? Price also developed a white powder for making silver.

But members of the Royal Society, to which Price belonged, insisted that he give a demonstration to its members, all notable scientists. Price had plenty of excuses not to do so, but finally relented in 1783. Then instead of creating gold in front of a panel of scientists, he staged a shocking suicide. Read about the life and death of the alchemist James Price at Amusing Planet.  

(Image credit: John Russell)

The placenta is an organ grown by a mammal fetus that attaches to the mother's uterus. The fetus gets its nutrition through the placenta, but communication goes both ways. Certain placental cells control how much and which kinds of nutrients are sent from the mother, according to fetal needs at different stages of pregnancy. That makes sense, but you may be surprised to learn that these cells' behavior in sending such signals vary depending on whether the genes that operate them came from the father or the mother!

Genes inherited from the father are more likely to demand nutrition, to ensure the health of the child. Genes inherited from the mother are less demanding, as they tend to ensure the health of the mother and her continued ability to reproduce. This aligns with the idea of survival of the fittest, in which the fittest means surviving long enough to produce offspring. This genetic tug-of-war is only a problem during a food scarcity crisis, which happens with every species at times, including humans. The wonder is how this mechanism works at the genetic level, and how scientists figured it out, which you can read about at SciTechDaily. -via Damn Interesting

(Image credit: Wei Hsu, Shang-Yi Chiu)

In 1970, Rupert Holmes was asked for a way to get notice for an unknown band from Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania. He said they should record a song that was guaranteed to get banned from radio, and he even wrote that song. The lyrics were a bit confusing at first, but if you listened closely, you understood that it was a tale of cannibalism. But the tune was very catchy, and "Timothy" by The Buoys got significant airplay before radio stations pulled it over the subject matter, which only made audiences more eager to hear it.  

Holmes explained that he had no idea the story in "Timothy" mimicked a real Pennsylvania mining disaster that occurred in 1963. The song was the only American Top 40 hit for The Buoys, although they had another song titled "Give Up Your Guns" that was a European hit. Rupert Holmes went on to record the #1 song "Escape (The Piña Colada Song)" in 1979. Holmes explains how he came up with the idea for "Timothy" and the scheme to get The Buoys on the charts at Mental Floss.

Christian Scafidi and his girlfriend Emma were walking outside soon after a hurricane blew through. They spotted a tiny pink thing, and when it moved, they were surprised it was still alive. They didn't know what kind of animal it was, but they took it in and fed it. Richard turned out to be a newborn squirrel, probably blown from the nest by the storm. They looked but never found his mother or siblings, and wildlife rehab wasn't equipped to take on a newborn. Christian really had no choice but to become a daddy to a needy hairless creature smaller than his hand who refused to give up.

The story has a happy ending. Richard survived, started to grow hair, and finally opened his eyes. He is now almost grown up and very much bonded to Christian. He even has his own Instagram page and TikTok gallery, where you can follow his progress.

If you are looking for some stimulation, try the newest game from neal.fun called Stimulation Clicker. When you start, there's only one button. Click it, and click it again and again. The more you click, the more options for stimulation you will collect. The collection of nonsense you see above cost me a few thousand "stimulations," but I didn't have to push the button for all of them, because eventually the button will take over. You'll have a chance to earn bonus stimulations and unlock achievements, too. If I were to leave this window open while I took a nap, there's no telling what I'd be able to stimulate myself with! It can get a bit noisy, though. Those who know tell me that the game does indeed end at some point, but I had to dump out at level 16 because I was getting overstimulated. Try Stimulation Clicker yourself and kiss an hour good bye.  -via Metafilter

At a roller rink in Essex, UK, a few days ago, an unfortunate skater lost his boot. The boot continued to skate around in the galley area on its own, but eventually reconnected with the skater. How'd that happen? If you've ever tried to roller skate, you know how important it is to keep those things tightly tied to your feet.  

It's not a once-in-a-lifetime coincidence, but a carefully planned trick called the ghost boot from professional skater Jack Matthew. You can see him practice the ghost boot here and showing off on the street here. The fact that he does this all the time doesn't make it any less impressive, because the route that skate took through a crowd of people completely separated from the rink is quite amazing. This video shows three different angles of the same trick. The first was a skater following him for this purpose, and the others are standing still to show what this looked like to spectators. You have to wonder how many times he tried this and had someone knock his ghost boot over before it returned to him. You can see Matthew's longer skating videos at YouTube. -via Nag on the Lake

The Goodyear Blimp is still around, still hovering over major sporting events to provide an aerial view, long after other airships and zeppelins have gone the way of the dodo. The blimp debuted in 1925, and although the official date is in the summer, Goodyear is taking the blimp on a year-long tour in celebration of the milestone, and even giving people a chance to ride in it.

But this is no 100-year-old dirigible. Goodyear has gone through a series of blimps and has four official Goodyear Blimps in service now. But at some time, you may have wondered how a tire company came to be known for its blimp. See, Goodyear is a rubber company, and in 1910 it began manufacturing rubber-coated fabric for aircraft, including airships. During World War I, the company started making blimps for the US Navy. In 1925, they built one for themselves and soon realized its promotional value. In honor of the Goodyear Blimp's 100th anniversary tour, Smithsonian tells us its history, and the history of airships in general.

(Image credit: Erik Drost)

In the 2000 movie Gladiator, Maximus (Russell Crowe) addresses the emperor Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix), who is learning the gladiator's identity for the first time. You know the quote: "My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, Commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions, loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next." It's an important moment in the movie, delivered with all the gravity it deserves. But only until Dustin Ballard, also known as There I Ruined It (previously at Neatorama), got hold of the clip.

In this version, it is anything but powerful, emotional, or dignified. It is, however, quite memorable with the music from Spongebob Squarepants. You'll laugh at the meowing tiger and probably start to think about the Roman Empire even more than you did before. Yes, we are entertained. -via Geeks Are Sexy

Odds are you're not part of the 1% (in fact those odds are 99%), but it doesn't hurt to take a peek into how those folks might live. We get that opportunity every once in a while when a expensive property is listed. The gallery of images for this home in Leverett, Massachusetts, opens with a lovely manmade lagoon featuring water slides, waterfalls, and tropical islands. Then it switched to aerial views and I couldn't find the lagoon. That's because this mammoth playground is indoors, and therefore useful all year round!

The house has 16 bedrooms and 25 bathrooms in a 99,990 square foot interior on a 57-acre lot. Really. That includes a kitchen with five ovens, two dishwashers, and at least five islands. Four tennis courts. A bowling alley. A stage. A circular office. A game room and arcade, home theater, and gym. A nine-hole golf course. Plus, besides the large formal dining room, you could retire to your medieval conference room in the basement for a game of D&D or LARPing. It's got a sauna, media room, outdoor pool, 14 fireplaces, and a guest house. Oh yeah, and an attached garage with heat and space for 65 cars, plus a detached garage and outdoor parking, too.

The property has been on the market for a couple of years now, and the price has dropped substantially from $23 million to $14.9 million, but the tax assessment is only $5.6 million. If the price drops to its assessed value, I'd consider it. That's easy to say when a house is laughably out of your league. See a gallery of 37 images that does not include a single bedroom or bathroom at the real estate listing. -via Fark

The most popular vegetable in the US is the potato. The majority of the country's potato crop goes into frozen food, most of which consists of french fries. McDonald's sells about nine million pounds of fries every day, making it their #1 item. And many folks say that McDonald's fries are the best you can get. Those fries are the result of years of research and struggle to standardize every serving of fries at every McDonald's outlet, so they will be the same no matter which restaurant you get them from. That doesn't mean they haven't changed over time. The biggest difference is when they changed what kind of oil they were fried in, a move that customers still lament if they are old enough to remember it. Tom Blank of Weird History Food explains what makes McDonald's fries so enticing. But remember, it's fast food, so you better eat them fast. Once they are cold, the magic is completely gone.

Sometimes comedy arises from a simple unfamiliarity with certain terms, and that goes double for projects that aren't as common as they once were. Redditor kiley_marie bought a bag of dried 16-bean soup. The instructions began with "Rinse and sort beans in a large pot." Her question was, "Why put 16 types of beans in a bag and then tell me to sort them?!"

What one may not realize is that to "sort beans" means to check the contents to make sure there aren't rocks included in the bag. It can happen, although it is rare in this day and age. Still, one pebble can break a tooth when you're chewing on beans. You should also be on the alert for twigs, dirt clods, and insects, not to mention beans that don't look edible. All that is an artifact of the way beans are harvested by machine. But I don't sort them in a large pot because using a cookie sheet with a lip is easier.

On the one hand, someone who has never prepared dried beans wouldn't know this, but on the other hand, the very idea of sorting all 16 kinds of beans is funny. Kiley_marie knew what she was doing. I have to admit that I would be tempted to sort at least some beans in this manner to see if there were really 16 kinds. I only count 14 in this picture.  

(Image credit: kiley_marie)

In 1502, Leonardo da Vinci designed a self-supporting bridge for Ottoman Sultan Beyazid II of Istanbul, intended to span the Bosphorus. It consisted only of interlocking beams with no supports underneath, no fasteners, and no mortar. The sultan didn't use the design, because he didn't believe it could possibly work. But it does, because of physics! What's more, the design is simple and portable, making it a useful military tool. Da Vinci wasn't the first to build bridges in this manner, as the Chinese used this concept a thousand years earlier, but Leonardo came up with it independently.  

Still, I can't help but think of all the things that could go wrong. Sure, the physics are sound, but it would be built and used by fallible humans. If you used one piece of weak wood, it could break. It you used wet or algae-covered wood, a tiny slip by someone walking on it could bring the whole thing down. If your builders make one mistake in construction, it could be a disaster. However, as an engineering concept, it's pretty darn cool. -via the Awesomer

Our earth is vast and filled with living things, including us. But you might not have a real grasp of the relative mass of all humans to all marine animals to livestock to plants. An interactive presentation called Biocubes shows us cubes of all the plant mass, all the animal mass, etc. so we can compare. You might not be surprised to learn how the biomass of all earth's plants dwarfs the biomass of animals, but you might gasp at how fungi and bacteria also take up way more space than animals. Then when we break down the animals cube, we find that most of our animals are in the ocean. Humans are a larger biomass than wild mammals, and our livestock biomass is bigger than humans and wild mammals combined.

But it's the last part of the presentation that's a real eye-opener. The "technomass" is the volume of the things humans have made, including building materials, plastic, and metal. An animated sequence shows how the technomass has grown over time until it dominates the earth and takes up more space than all living things combined. It's a breathtaking journey with lots of information along the way. -via kottke

The genius of the best modern mashups in which characters cross over from disparate TV shows lies in their comedic value, sure, but it doesn't work without great editing skills. In this one, the YouTuber behind Alternative Cuts took three weeks to place drug dealer Tuco Salamanca from the series Breaking Bad into the competition of Squid Game. Tuco's not taking mistreatment from anyone- even when his life is at stake. Oh no, he's not going to win the game for sure, but he might make it worth watching. He fits in so well, not logically, but in a perfectly-edited way.

Alternative Cuts teased that he will have more of these. He's working on bringing the entire crew from Breaking Bad into participating on the Red Light, Green Light game from Squid Game. He says it should take about a month to get that one ready to post. -via Laughing Squid

There's been a conundrum in the world of Star Trek that's been bothering fans many years. Why do Klingons look so different in every Star Trek TV series? For some of us, it's easy to explain. Star Trek: The Original Series aired in the 1960s with a measly special effects budget. To indicate an alien, all they had to do was change the shape of his ears or eyebrows, or give him an "exotic" mustache. By the time Star Trek: The Motion Picture and Star Trek: The Next Generation came about, there was money for prosthetics and they were able to make aliens look more alien. And that was fun, so they threw more into the special makeup effects with each series afterward.

But that doesn't make sense within the universe of Star Trek. Avid fans like their fantasy worlds to have a logical cohesion. You really can't blame them for wanting an explanation, because this is the kind of thing that can nag at you over the years. The producers have listened to enough complaints, and in a recent episode of Star Trek: Lower Decks, this season's finale, there appears to be somewhat of an explanation. However, even if you watched it, it could be confusing. An article at Inverse tries to parse the different ways Klingons look, although it won't be satisfactory to all fans.